Economist of the Day

Paul Collier

Born: April 23^rd, 1949

Died: N.A.

Summary: An English Economist. He specializes in political and economic development in poor nations.  He is a professor of Economics and Public Policy at the University of Oxford. From 1998 to 2003 he was the director of the Development Research Group of the World Bank. His book The Plundered Planet gives three equations about what can happen in a country based on the presence or lack of three variables. The first equation is Nature minus Technology plus Regulation equals Starvation. The second equation is Nature plus Technology minus Regulation equals Plunder. The third and final equation is Nature plus Technology Plus Regulation equals Prosperity. The book also attempts to find a balance between complete disregard for nature and nothing but regard for nature. In his book The Bottom Billion, he tries to explain why certain countries fail to prosper even when they are give large amounts of aid from developed nations.

Notable Works: The Plundered Planet, The Bottom Billion, Wars, Guns and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places, Exodus: How Migration is Changing Our World

Economist of the Day

Nicholas Stern

Born: April 22^nd, 1946

Died: N.A.

Summary: An English Economist and Academic. He specialized in political and developmental economics. In the past, he has given lectures at Oxford University from 1970 to 1977. From 1978 to 1987 Stern taught economics at Warwick University.  Later, from 1987 to 1993, he taught at the London School of Economics. In 1993, Stern served as Chief Economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. During his time at the bank, he conducted a large amount of research on economic development and the Green Revolution in India. He was the Chief Economist of the World Bank from 2000 to 2003. In 2007 he became the first I. G. Patel Chair of the London School of Economics. He was also made chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment in 2008.

Notable Works: The Economics of Climate Change, The Theory for Taxation in the Developing World, The Global Deal: Climate Change and the Creation of a New Era of Progress and Prosperity

Economist of the Day

Douglas Elmendorf

Born: April 16^th, 1962

Died: N.A.

Summary: An American Economist and Politician. He received his bachelor’s degree in economics from Princeton University, and later received his doctorate in economics from Harvard University. In 1993 he began working at the Congressional Budget Office. In 1994 he was moved to the Federal Reserve Board. By 1998 he was a member of the Council of Economic Advisors. In 1999, he began working at the United States Treasury Department under Treasury Secretary George Lawrence Summers. In 2002, Elmendorf returned to the Fed as a senior economist, and lead a team of 30 economists to predict interest rates and labor market conditions. In 2007, he left the public sector to work for the Brookings Institution, an economic think tank. He also directed the Hamilton Project, an economic policy forum that focused on reducing the trade deficit and increasing free trade. Most recently, in 2009, he was appointed Director of the Congressional Budget Office, and his term only ended in 2015. 

Notable Works: Brookings Papers on Economic Activity: Spring 2008, Should America save for its old age? Population Aging, National Saving, and Fiscal Policy, The Effect of Interest Rate Changes on Household Savings and Consumption

Economist of the Day

Yvan Loubier

Born: April 10^th, 1959

Died: N.A.

Summary: A Canadian Politician and Economist. He is one of the founders of the Bloc Québécois, a federalist political party that strives to represent Quebec’s interests in the Canadian parliament, and establish Quebec as an independent nation. He served as a representative in the Canadian parliament with the Bloc Québécois from 1994 to 2007. While in parliament, he served as chair of Canada’s Subcommittee on Fiscal Imbalance. He has worked towards the development of the Romaine River Hydroelectric power plant. He has also worked toward increased opportunity and better living conditions for Canada’s indigenous peoples. Prior to his career as a politician, he served as a consultant on trade and economic policy. He currently works at “National”, a public relations and counseling firm. He advises others on energy, mining, forestry, and food processing. He has written frequently for newspapers La Presse and Le Soleil.

Notable Works: La détermination des assurances collectives au Canada (The Determination of Canadian Group Insurance) Structure and economic importance of the Canadian food and beverage manufacturing sector: Highlights from 1970 to 1981

Economist of the Day

John Hicks

Born: April 8^th, 1904

Died: May 20^th, 1989

Summary: An English Economist. He studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford. He formalized the theories put forth by John Maynard Keynes in The General Theory of Interest, Employment, and Money. He also put forth the elasticity of substitution theory, which states that labor saving techniques do not necessarily reduce the labor force’s share of national income. He also co-created the Kaldor-Hicks efficiency with Nicholas Kaldor. The theory states that economic policy should only be pursued if it helps more than it hurts and those helped can somehow compensate those hurt completely and still be better off. In his book Value and Capital, he contributed to general equilibrium theory, which differs from partial equilibrium, since general equilibrium is about the aggregate, not individual markets. In said book, he wrote that many of the assumptions made about value theory could be reached without measuring the utility of a good or service. He also made contributions to consumer demand theory. 

Notable Works: Value and Capital, The Theory of Wages, The Social Framework: An Introduction to Economics, Capital and Growth, A Contribution to the Theory of the Trade Cycle, A Revision of Demand Theory

Economist of the Day

Victor Bodiu

Born: March 27^th, 1971

Died: N.A.

Summary: A Moldovan Economist and Politician. He has two college degrees, one in Banking and Finance, the other in Physics and Engineering. From 1994 to 1999, he worked for the governments of Moldova and Ukraine on various privatization, taxation, stock market development, financial market development, and licensing issues. From 1999-2001 he served as the Director General of the Privatization Department of Moldova. From 2001 to 2009 Bodiu worked at the Raiffeisen Bank to promote growth in Eastern European countries. He did this by overseeing Raifeisen’s investments in Romania and Moldova, monitoring investments, privatizations, mergers, acquisitions, and partnerships. He did this for several industries, but mostly for pharmaceuticals, telecommunications, infrastructure, heavy industry, food & drink, and financial services. Starting in 2009, Bodiu served as Secretary General of Moldova. He worked behind Rethink Moldova, which was a government project pledging 1.8 billion Euros to finance different sectors of the Moldovan Economy. He also worked to modernize the Moldovan Public Administration with Central Public Administration Reform, bringing modern technologies to the government to make it more efficient. In 2010 he organized the emergency responses to the summer Moldovan floods, and represented Moldova at the Council of Europe Bank.

Notable Works: National Development Strategy Moldova 2020

Economist of the Day

Xenephon Zolotas

Born: March 26^th, 1904

Died: June 19^th, 2004

Xenophon Zolotas was a Greek Economist who served as Prime Minister of Greece. He studied Economics at the University of Athens, and later became an Economics Professor at the Aristotle University at Thessaloniki. He held senior posts on the International Monetary fund. He was director of the Bank of Greece from 1944 to 1945, 1955-1967, and 1974 to 1981. He was a Keynesian/socialist economist, and many of his works reflected his views. He argued that Keynesianism was best following the works of Romanian mathematician Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen and the second law of thermodynamics. That is, if there is a closed system of energy, the energy within that system will increase. In his book Economic Growth and Declining Social Welfare, he argued that most modern economic growth is not in fields that make humanity better off, and so simply growing the economy will not be enough to make people happy. For example, he argued that advertisements had little use in making people happier, it only had use in making them consume more, and so with the modern economy relying more and more on advertising, humanity will not be happier even though the economy will grow. He gave two well-known speeches to the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development on September 26^th, 1957 and October 2^nd, 1959.

Notable Works: Economic Growth and Declining Social Welfare, Speculocracy and the International Monetary System: Three Lectures, International monetary issues and development policies: Selected essays and statements, Monetary Equilibrium and Economic Development